Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said he's open to considering changes to the retirement plans for members of the military. The military compensation and retirement modernization commission has submitted its recommendations to the the secretary's office. Retired Marine Lt. Gen. Jack Klimp is president and CEO of the National Association for Uniformed Services. On In Depth with Francis Rose, he said the commission's work may be a good starting point for the discussion.

Enlisted Navy and Marine Corps service members have a new, easier route to medical school. It's called the Enlisted-to-Medical Degree Preparatory Program. It puts them on equal footing with counterparts in the Army and Air Force. Dr. Art Kellermann is Dean of the F. Edward Hébert School of Medicine at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. He joined the Federal Drive with Tom Temin to explain how the new program works.

Maureen Casey with JP Morgan Chase and Company, and the Rand Corporation's Dr. Margaret Harrell, join host Derrick Dortch to talk about a new report that looks at lessons learned from a program that helps veterans find jobs in private sector.
December 19, 2014

Maureen Casey with JP Morgan Chase and Company, and the Rand Corporation's Dr. Margaret Harrell, join host Derrick Dortch to talk about a new report that looks at lessons learned from a program that helps veterans find jobs in private sector.
November 21, 2014 (Encore presentation November 28, 2014)

In this edition of "Inside the DoD Reporter's Notebook," the Navy and Marine Corps have agreed to migrate their security infrastructure into JRSS, and all the services have agreed on the basic technical and policy questions.

The Marine Corps will begin a small scale pilot in the next several weeks to determine whether commercial-grade security containers on mobile devices can meet DoD's security demands. If it's successful, Marines envision a BYOD strategy that begins implementation as soon as next year.

The Department of Defense expects a longer and possibly a more costly withdrawal of Army and Marine Corps equipment from Afghanistan than in Iraq, according to a Government Accountability Office report released on Tuesday.

The Marine Corps has settled a
complaint with a high-profile whistleblower. Marine Corps civilian scientist Franz Gayl had raised concerns about delays in sending the blast-resistant
trucks known as M-RAPs to Afghanistan and Iraq. Now, after the seven-year battle,
the service is pledging to create a better environment for whistleblowers. Tom
Devine is the legal director for the Government Accountability Project and he
represented Franz Gayl. He joined Tom Temin on the Federal Drive with the details of the case.

Franz Gayl's seven-year Whistleblower Protection Act complaint case against the United States Marine Corps has come to an end. On top of preserving Gayl's position, the deal also appoints Gayl to a new team tasked with developing guidelines for whistleblower rights.

Suicides among active-duty military rose this year compared with the same period last year, but Pentagon officials indicate more service members are seeking help through hotlines and other aid programs. Pentagon documents obtained by The Associated Press show there were 161 confirmed or suspected suicides as of July 14, compared with 154 during the same time frame in 2013. The increase was among the Air Force and Navy, while soldiers and Marine suicides went down.

A day after the U.S. hit several Russian arms companies with sanctions over the Ukraine conflict, a top U.S. general is warning that congressional efforts to cut off dealings with Moscow's main weapons exporter could be "catastrophic" for U.S. forces. Marine General Joseph Dunford, commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said 88 Russian helicopters the Pentagon is buying for Afghan security forces were critical for protecting U.S.troops that remain in the country after the end of this year.